Short Stories

the death of my brother saved my life

Like any other year, on the 4th, my family and I would go to the beaches of Florida and watch the fireworks in the distance, but this year, I will never forget the 4th of July. At the age of 18, I still lived with my parents. You can't beat cheap rent and free food. I had very few friends, more or fewer coworkers I only talked to at work. So my pool of people to hang out with was very limited when I offered a free trip to Florida. I was excited and glad to have spent time with my mom and dad. I was not the only child. My brother not long ago passed away, but now it's just my parents and me. On the 3rd, we packed everything in the car before the sun came up and began our long drive. We lived in Tennessee, so we had to pass through Georgia to get to Florida, a trip we had taken many times before, but this time would be our last as a family. I stared out the window like nature when I saw something pass through the trees along with the car. I chalked it up to the lighting or something reasonable and decided to put on my earphones and listen to music to pass the time. I heard my parents scream as the car suddenly came to a stop. My eyes flew open as I lurched forward into my seat belt. It yanked me back to the seat. My head was wiped on, tossing my earphones into the back seat in front of me. As I looked, my dad was gripping the steering wheel with white knuckles could see he was in shock from something I didn't know about. I turned to my mother, who had the proper grip on the OS bar. 

Her other hand was gripping the bottom of the seat. Outside the windshield, the car's hood bent towards us like we hit a street, and steam rose to the air. We were for sure not driving away in this car. In my view, it was clearly in a state that was not fixable. The pain was like a tsunami, my headache along with my neck. I groaned at the pain and rubbed my neck. My dad turned around and said, "there's something out there that that....'' I cut him off with a rude comment, "I'm fine, thanks for asking. I guess I'll look at the engine." Before I opened my door, my mother's door threw open, and she was pulled out. My dad was so shocked he didn't stop staring forward. I quickly jumped out of the car and dashed into the forest after her, but after a few minutes, I ran out of breath, and my father came from behind. He was out of breath as well and said, "why are you running through the forest?" I looked at him angrily and said, "you going to let whatever that took, mom?'' He tilted his head in confusion and said, "your mom is in the car? You just dashed out of the car into the woods. Come on, let's go back and stop playing your games." I took a step back and said, "I'm not making this up!" Dad stood up straight and said, " listen. You may be an adult, but you better watch your tone with me. Now let's go back to the car.'' I gave in as the child in me knew he was earnest now, and it was best to listen to him. 

We walked back to the car, where mom stood with her phone against her face, angrily talking to someone on the other side. She huffed in anger, put the phone down, and said, "there is no tow truck nearby open, and the only one would be 4 hours from the night, which puts us in the dark." Dad nodded and said, "It's okay; people shoot fireworks off at night on the 4th, at least the big ones, so I'm not too worried." My mom's glance turned to me as she said, "and you're running through the woods like a madman for....." before I could say anything, my dad said, "clearly, she thinks you were taken by something and pulled into the woods." I yelled, "she was, but I don't know if it's okay. I know what I saw and did what I thought was right. DROP IT." Dad was about to say something about my choice of words, but my mom gave him a look as I passed her and entered the car. I turned on my phone, saw it was a low battery, and sighed as I looked for my charger block. I couldn't find it and figured I had forgotten it. I groaned in annoyance before putting my earphones on and closing my eyes as I laid into the back seat with my legs out of the car door.

All the running made me extremely tired, so I quickly passed out. The sounds of screaming woke me up. I shot up to see it was dark all around the bugs, and nightlife was sounding all around me as if I was only in the car or around it. I got up, slid out, and tried to turn on my phone light but saw it had died. I tossed it into the car with my earphones and closed the door. I looked around before yelling, "mom! Dad! Where are yall!" With my hand cupped around my mouth. I didn't hear anything back. I stretched for a moment, thinking about what to do. I glanced both ways down the street and saw nothing on my right but in the far distance to my left was what seemed to be a tow truck. I waited on it to pull up, but as it got closer or further, its lights appeared to stay the same distance away.